Eilers residents want united front

By peter roper
The pueblo chieftain

Published: January 8, 2014;Last modified: June 18, 2014 04:43PM

The fastest way to get the Eilers neighborhood on and off the federal Superfund list of contaminated areas will be to keep neighbors united in their demands on federal, state and local officials — according to the Eilers Heights Neighborhood Association.

Pam Kocman, association president, drove that message home at a neighborhood meeting of about 40 residents Tuesday night.

Kocman and her husband, Joe, have been the informal neighborhood leaders in the two-year standoff with the federal Environmental Protection Agency and state health officials over lead contamination in soil and blood tests in the South Side area.

That standoff ended last week when City Council and the Pueblo County commissioners sent a letter to Gov. John Hickenlooper asking that the area be put on the federal Superfund list for cleanup.

But Tuesday’s meeting focused on adding conditions to that letter — such as setting a firm boundary for any cleanup and giving the EPA a short timetable, such as five years to get the job done.

“That’s why our citizen advisory group will be so important,” Kocman insisted. “EPA has flexibility to help if we insist on it.”

EPA officials were at the meeting along with some council members and Commissioner Terry Hart.

Joe Kocman said he remained unconvinced the Eilers area has serious contamination problems but said city and county officials have made that decision.

“Now we have to put forward a unified front and keep their feet to the fire,” he said.

Among the conditions he wants is a requirement that all lead contamination be cleaned up — in yards, exterior paints and inside houses. EPA’s own studies show that cleaning up yard contamination may not solve lead exposure problems if it’s coming from house paint, he said.

Sabrina Forrest, the EPA’s state Superfund coordinator, said the agency does clean up yard and exterior paint problems, but would have to get help from other federal or state agencies to deal with interior lead paint problems.

David Webb, a real estate agent who is moving into the neighborhood, told council members they were wrong to sign the Hickenlooper letter. He said Superfund listing would cripple the neighborhood’s real estate values for a decade or more and could cause the area to become a “slum” of untended rental properties.

But another man said he was already having tenants move out of his buildings because of the contamination question.